Having the church in one's heart as it is in God's.

On the current flurry of UFO "disclosure" documentaries on streaming services, and the warning of some, such as Whitley Strieber, of a coming "ontological shock" when people find out "the truth." One of the groups he claims will experience it the most are scientists. John wonders what sort of shock this might be: as in Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke, or the Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu, or as what Neo experienced in the Matrix? Government whistleblower's like David Grusch claim to have access to dozens of credible witnesses with direct knowledge of "non-human biologics" and exotic off-world technologies. So what? Science bets everything on the Standard Model, with a predictable rolling back of events to the Big Bang, etc. But what if people like physicist Melvin Vopson are on to something when they hypothesize that we are in a simulated reality, like a video game? AI generated graphics have made what is produced indistinguishable from what is "real".... and in such a realm, there are trees that haven't grown, mountains that weren't uplifted by tectonics, etc. (Phillip Gosse wrote of this in his book "Omphalos," in which he defends the "Genesis Gap" idea that between the first two verses in Genesis there is a span of unknown time, and what is here was begun with the appearance of age... trees fully formed with tree rings, wouldn't Adam also be formed... with a belly button?) Such a thing would overthrow most everything in science. And, John wonders, whether perhaps we should disengage from AI while we can, let it go its way, and let us go along separated from it. Otherwise, will it not simply shape our existence? (Or terminate it, a la Skynet?) But as to UAPs/UFOs, it is hard to argue against what has been experienced by persons such as Dorothy Izatt ("Capturing the Light") who recorded inexplicable things on various frames of her 8mm or Super-8 film footage. So perhaps something IS ready to "drop," but what would it be? Perhaps it would undo the naturalistic/materialistic view of scientism, along with the supernatural beliefs of many world religions. Quantum mechanics has already knocked down a straight-on causalistic view of nature. But in a simulated reality, such as in the Matrix, where the baddie who betrays the good guys gives it up for a life of simulated luxury ("I know this steak isn't real...") but... as Bishop Berkeley argued, what is reality anyway but what is PERCEIVED? Beyond that, can we prove our sense organs truly exist? Can we prove we have noses, ears, eyes, or even optic nerves? And should we care? What would matter to John would be not if ANYTHING is there, but is ANYONE there? That is the side he is sold out on... there is SOMEONE who has fashioned all this who did it for me and cares about me... and that we can reach. What if the data we have collected in science has been provided in anticipation that it WOULD be? Perhaps not even as John Wheeler's Participatory Anthropic Principle (PAP) would have it, but rather as John Berglund's ANTICIPATORY Anthropic Principle would? The act of observation that collapses the wave function in Quantum Mechanics points to power of the observer which is of the same type that must be collapsing the wave function of the ENTIRE UNIVERSE. Anyway... Jacques Vallee has an interesting idea about who the entities on these UAPs might be. John himself had an experience when he was a teen during one dark winter's night in Minnesota. It began his solipsistic struggle, which was solved only upon reaching out to the Creator who was able to bypass his secondary senses to reach directly into him, and knowing Him, John is convinced everything (and everyone) else is just as real as it NEEDS to be. We all have the means to contact God directly... no need for radio telescopes seeking out the universe for some signal. As Insane Clown Posse sings in "Thine Unveiling"... "He's out there!" The "physical" world plays second fiddle to the TRUE reality, and there is much more to come.

TBA

John talks about the development of AlphaGo/DeepMind and how it defeated Lee SeDol based on the book The Maniac about John von Neumann. What will the impact of AI be (and already is)? Roger Penrose argues that AI cannot reach self-awareness outside quantum computing in his book The Emperor's New Mind. He speaks about the impact of measurement on the the wave function and the Copenhagen Interpretation of QM. The creators of the powerful AI programs themselves cannot track or "see" what is going on in the programs. John speaks on how science uses the notion of infinity to explain away the appearance of design (mentioning the book Just Six Numbers by Martin Rees) and hence string theory with its cosmic landscape wherein "anything" that can happen MUST happen (even, for instance, such things that would appear too great for coincidence to explain). John speaks of the correspondence of Copenhagen's Interpretation with George Berkeley's Idealism. John mentions the Many Worlds Interpretation of QM was initiated by Hugh Everett III and supported by Bryce DeWitt just because the Copenhagen Interpretation seemed to support that idea that there must be an Observer outside the universe collapsing the wave function of the entire universe, which was an idea that any "good" scientist, governed by scientific materialism, must reject. Science only accepts materialistic/naturalistic explanation and seeks to get rid of the "God of the gaps." But because John believes in Romance, he rejects the materialistic world-view, and argues that science ends up erasing Romance as a notion when Romance itself is THE reason for the universe, and hence the meaning of human existence. Even should science allows for humanity to fill the universe, so what? Without knowing the ultimate purpose of existence, what inherent value would humanity possess? John goes on to describe how science uses the notion of infinity to suggest he might be a "Boltzmann brain," although John questions that assumption that memory is simply a configuration of physical characteristics within the brain. John refers to Jim Alkalili's comment at the end of his "Everything and Nothing" documentary that we humans are but the "leftovers" of the collision of matter and antimatter! Apart from Love, humanity's existence is meaningless, but this is not the case, since Love, to John, is evident as seen even through the lens of scientific discovery, and even increasingly evident as more is known (such as the further discovery of universal numbers/constants/parameters that have to be "just so" for us to be here). In addition, John urges the listener to consider the many incredible abilities humans exhibit, even if not "savants". Feats of art, music, memory, etc., cannot be explained other than some Endowment. Furthermore, Copenhagen points to a great correspondence between our own minds and One that is pointed to that upholds the universe itself as our habitation. We correspond and answer to that Mind. Why studiously ignore the obvious evidence of design and push it away by appealing to infinities, O science? There remains the testimony of many "experiencers" that points to the ultimate knowing of why we are here. Why not try the experiment that brought them into that reality?

TBA

TBA

TBA

John begins by remarking on Alice Cooper's "Caught in a Dream," the first song on the first album he heard of his, on how he would like to get Alice Cooper on the show to ask whether Cooper felt that way upon his meteoric rise, and how difficult a thing solipsism is to overcome, without faith. John relates the "coincidence" (miracle?) of the flavored water, and how such things no longer seem so remarkable, as a person of faith. He mentions how someone claimed the word "church" had become a trigger to him. To John, however, the Church has that kind of importance to God Himself, being His Body, His Bride, His family... basically His eternal purpose, for which He created the universe! So...yeah. It is the focus of the Bible: this romance. In Ephesians 5 Christ's desire is to present to Himself the Church as a "glorious Bride." The end of the Bible represents the culmination of the ages as the marriage of the Lamb (Christ) and the New Jerusalem (God's people). The Bible begins with a couple, in which Eve is "built" out of what is taken from Adam's side as he sleeps. On the cross, where Christ dies (sleeps), His side is opened, from which blood and water flow (John 19:34), producing the Church, to be His counterpart. The Church is not Sunday meetings, or even Christian fellowship, but it simply ALL the believers, whoever who has received Christ [making every believer, male or female, a son of God (Galatians 3:26 and 4:6; Romans 8:29) -- and every believer is, male or female, espoused as a pure virgin to Christ (2 Corinthians 11:2).] Christ works in every believer to produce the Church as something that corresponds to Him as Eve was to complete Adam. In John 1:1, Christ was "pros" or face-to-face with God in eternity past, and in the future we as the Bride of Christ must be those who can eternally be face-to-face with Christ in eternity future. The Bible is a romance. It begins and ends with a couple. Just like all romances modeled on the Bible, an interloper shows up, but eventually the two meant together end up REALLY together, even after it all. The Song of Songs encapsulates this, where Solomon (Shlomo) and the Shulamite are just male and female versions of the same name, and the process is seen where the Bride eventually is produced as the one everyone marvels at. ("Who is this that comes up out of the wilderness, leaning on her beloved?") We didn't make ourselves; GOD did (Psalm 100). Shall we not find out what the ultimate realization of our existence should be, even though it may be beyond anything we could have imagined? Without this, our lives never become meaningful, even though we may feel the best thing we can do is love others... yet without being connected to God as our source, will we be able to love as He loves? "Taste and see that the Lord is good" (Psalm 34:8). (John plays "The Impossible Dream" sung by Don Quixote from "man of la mancha" and "True Companion" by Jonathan Byrd, cut out of respect to songs' owners.) John ends with how someone who promotes the Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics would view the "miracles of coincidence" John mentions at the beginning of the show would view such things.... but really? (music edited for copyright reasons)

On Platonic forms/Gnosticism of "The Place of the Lion" by Chas Williams and influence upon C.S. Lewis per "The Battle for Middle Earth" by Jos. Loconte and how JRR Tolkein and CS Lewis viewed their work (i.e., The Rings, Narnia) in response to the rising materialism/cynicism of Western Civilization. In like manner, John wonders at the transcendent reality behind the seen, talks of scientific resistance to design regardless the evidence, because it challenges Darwinism (hence string theory and the cosmic landscape) and to God being outside of time and space regardless what quantum mechanics' evidence, because it challenges the Copernican "revolution" (hence the Many Worlds interpretation). John remarks on Darwin's impact on those who grow up initially believing in the goodness of what lies behind creation with its implication that God isn't there at all, depriving them of joy. He sings a song from the perspective of one who grew up believing but becomes jaded due to instruction that there must be no God. John believes the evidence points to a profound love, from the instigation of the universe to the arrival of God's Son to die on the cross and to rise again as the realization of it all.

John found a set of six songs from ten years prior he had played on his show. He refers to the previous show a week ago about the clan formed around the "runty" predator in Predator and the Badlands movie, and how that was what he himself was looking for, that kind of "clan" experience as... a CHURCH life where there was such commitment to each other! John shares how this was what the church life was like when (and where) he first became a Christian. In Oberlin there might be people who would want to open their homes for such a thing. Then John shares about his experience with a pickup truck prior to the show, and how it made him wonder whether there couldn't be a culture change where the habit just became to be the person who watched over the person in front of them, in a kind of chain of care while people drove down the roads (!) Why could that not become a thing? The first song John plays is "King of My Life" with T-Bone and Natalie LaRue. The second song is "Brighter Day" by Kirk Franklin. The third is another Kirk Franklin song that starred many other famous artists (Bono, Crystal Lewis, R. Kelly, etc.) called "Lean on Me." The fourth is a song from his own past, sung by Kathy Shank, which is simply Psalm 139 put to music. The fifth is "Dear Slim" by KJ52, in which KJ52 addresses Eminem. John talks about bands from Detroit: Eninem, Insane Clown Posse, Alice Cooper (and KJ52)... and whether Cooper's parents were playing a "long game" with him when they encouraged his early rock career, as ICP had been when they unveiled that they were always "behind God" and hoped the Juggalos would also find God. Was Alice Cooper, by continuing his "shtick," also playing a long game for the sake of his followers, now that he is a Christian? That is what John wonders. The sixth song is by Nicole Nordeman ... "What If?" John ends his show playing "Asleep In The Light" by Keith Green, after being unable to play "The Name" by Mali Music.